Progress Software Corporation is an American

public company A public company is a company whose ownership is organized via shares of share capital, stock which are intended to be freely traded on a stock exchange or in over-the-counter (finance), over-the-counter markets. A public (publicly traded) co ...

that produces

software Software consists of computer programs that instruct the Execution (computing), execution of a computer. Software also includes design documents and specifications. The history of software is closely tied to the development of digital comput ...

for creating and deploying business applications. Founded in

Burlington, Massachusetts Burlington is a town in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 26,377 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. History It is believed that Burlington takes its name from the English town of Bridlington, York ...

with offices in 16 countries, the company posted revenues of $531.3 million (USD) in 2021 and employs approximately 2100 people.

History

1980s: DLC to Progress Software

Progress Software was co-founded by several

MIT The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Established in 1861, MIT has played a significant role in the development of many areas of modern technology and sc ...

graduates, including Joseph W. Alsop, Clyde Kessel, and Chip Ziering in 1981. Originally called Data Language Corporation (DLC), the company changed its name to Progress Software in 1987, the same name of its main product, Progress.

1990s: Public company

In 1991, Progress Software joined the

NASDAQ The Nasdaq Stock Market (; National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations) is an American stock exchange based in New York City. It is the most active stock trading venue in the U.S. by volume, and ranked second on the list ...

2000s: Broad expansion

In 2002, Progress Software acquired Stylus Studio developer eXcelon Corporation for approximately $24 million. In 2003, Progress Software acquired DataDirect Technologies for $88 million. In 2004, Progress Software acquired Persistence Software for $16 million. In 2005, Progress acquired

complex event processing Event processing is a method of tracking and analyzing (processing) streams of information (data) about things that happen (events), and deriving a conclusion from them. Complex event processing (CEP) consists of a set of concepts and techniques de ...

company Apama. In January 2006, Progress Software acquired Actional Corporation. In 2006, Progress Software acquired Neon Systems, a company specializing in modernizing

3270 The IBM 3270 is a family of block oriented display and printer computer terminals introduced by IBM in 1971 and normally used to communicate with IBM mainframes. The 3270 was the successor to the IBM 2260 display terminal. Due to the text c ...

applications. In 2008, Progress Software acquired Xcalia, a data integration company, and Mindreef, which developed SOAPscope products. In September 2008, Progress acquired

IONA Technologies IONA Technologies, Inc. was an Irish software company founded in 1991. It began as a campus company linked to Trinity College Dublin had its headquarters in Dublin, and eventually also expanded its offices in Boston and Tokyo. It specialised i ...

, developer of

service-oriented architecture In software engineering, service-oriented architecture (SOA) is an architectural style that focuses on discrete services instead of a monolithic design. SOA is a good choice for system integration. By consequence, it is also applied in the field ...

platforms Artix and Orbix, for $146 million.

2010s: Focusing and rebranding

In 2010, Progress Software acquired business process management vendor Savvion Inc. In April 2011, Progress Software sold their

SWIFT Swift or SWIFT most commonly refers to: * SWIFT, an international organization facilitating transactions between banks ** SWIFT code * Swift (programming language) * Swift (bird), a family of birds It may also refer to: Organizations * SWIF ...

integration product "ADS" (formally Iona's "Artix Data Services") to C24 Technologies Ltd. The product was re-branded to its former name "Integration Objects". In 2012, Progress announced its shift to become a much more narrowly focused specialist vendor, looking to sell or decommission most of their existing products. In June 2012, the company sold its open source division FuseSource, which was

spun out ''Spun Out'' is a Canadian television sitcom created by Jeff Biederman, Brent Piaskoski and Brian K. Roberts for CTV. It premiered on March 6, 2014 and ended on October 3, 2015, with a total of 26 episodes over the course of two seasons. Premise ...

from the IONA business in October 2010, to

Red Hat Red Hat, Inc. (formerly Red Hat Software, Inc.) is an American software company that provides open source software products to enterprises and is a subsidiary of IBM. Founded in 1993, Red Hat has its corporate headquarters in Raleigh, North ...

. In October 2012, Progress Software sold the brands Sonic, Savvion, Actional and DataXtend (DXSI) to

Trilogy A trilogy is a set of three distinct works that are connected and can be seen either as a single work or as three individual works. They are commonly found in literature, film, and video games. Three-part works that are considered components of ...

which created the company Aurea Software. In December 2012, the Orbix, Orbacus and Artix product lines were sold to

Micro Focus International Micro Focus International plc was a British multinational software and information technology business based in Newbury, Berkshire, England. The firm provided software and consultancy. The company was listed on the London Stock Exchange and t ...

for $15 million. In 2013, Progress Software acquired Rollbase Inc. and

Software AG Software GmbH, trading as Software AG, is a German multinational software corporation that develops enterprise software for business process management, integration, and big data analytics. Founded in 1969, the company is headquartered in Darmstad ...

acquired Apama activities from Progress Software. In 2014, Progress acquired Cincinnati-based Modulus. Also in 2014, Progress acquired

Telerik Telerik AD () is a Bulgarian company offering software tools for web, mobile, desktop application development, tools and subscription services for cross-platform application development. Founded in 2002 as a company focused on ASP.NET, .NET develo ...

, a provider of application development tools. In 2019, Progress Software acquired

Ipswitch, Inc. Ipswitch is an IT management software developer for small and medium sized businesses. The company was founded in 1991 and is headquartered in Burlington, Massachusetts and has operations in Atlanta (Alpharetta) and Augusta, Georgia, American F ...

, an IT management vendor known for its

MOVEit MOVEit is a managed file transfer software product produced by Ipswitch, Inc. (now part of Progress Software). MOVEit encrypts files and uses file transfer protocols such as FTP( S) or SFTP to transfer data, as well as providing automation serv ...

managed file transfer Managed file transfer (MFT) is a technology that provides the secure transfer of data in an efficient and reliable manner. MFT software is marketed to companies as a more secure alternative to using insecure protocols like FTP (file transfer prot ...

platform. In May 2016, Progress Software re-branded as "Progress" in an effort to "shed any doubts it was not living up to its name".

2020s: Targeted expansion

In 2020, Progress Software announced the acquisition of Chef Software Inc., the developers of the

Chef A chef is a professional Cook (profession), cook and tradesperson who is proficient in all aspects of outline of food preparation, food preparation, often focusing on a particular cuisine. The word "chef" is derived from the term (), the di ...

configuration management tool. The acquisition was completed by October 2020. In 2021, Progress Software acquired

Kemp Technologies Kemp, Inc. is an American technology company that was founded in 2000 in Bethpage, New York. The company builds load balancing products which balances user traffic between multiple application servers in a physical, virtual or cloud environmen ...

, who build load balancing products. The acquisition was completed on November 1, 2021. In 2023, Progress Software acquired database vendor MarkLogic Corporation. In 2024, Progress Software acquired

ShareFile ShareFile is a secure content collaboration, file sharing and sync software that supports all the document-centric tasks and workflow needs of small and large businesses. The company also offers cloud-based or on-premises storage, virtual da ...

from Cloud Software. The acquisition was completed on October 31, 2024.

Products

The Progress portfolio includes solutions for enterprise integration,

data Data ( , ) are a collection of discrete or continuous values that convey information, describing the quantity, quality, fact, statistics, other basic units of meaning, or simply sequences of symbols that may be further interpreted for ...

interoperability, and application development, including

Software as a Service Software as a service (SaaS ) is a cloud computing service model where the provider offers use of application software to a client and manages all needed physical and software resources. SaaS is usually accessed via a web application. Unlike o ...

(SaaS) enablement and delivery.

Current products

Sitefinity Telerik AD () is a Bulgarian company offering software tools for web, mobile, desktop application development, tools and subscription services for cross-platform application development. Founded in 2002 as a company focused on ASP.NET, .NET develo ...

– web content management. * Sitefinity Digital Experience Cloud – customer experience tool for customer journey analysis, personalization, and optimization. * NativeChat – an AI platform for creating and deploying chatbots. * Corticon – business rules engine. * Kemp LoadMaster * Flowmon * WhatsUp Gold *

* Kendo UI – UI toolkit for web development. *

– UI tools for .NET development. *

Test Studio Progress Telerik Test Studio is a Windows-based software test automation tool for web and desktop that supports functional testing, software performance testing, load testing and RESTful API testing developed by Telerik. The tool ships with a p ...

– test automation. * Fiddler Everywhere *DataDirect Connectors – connectors to integrate data across relational, big data and cloud databases. * DataDirect Hybrid Data Pipeline – hybrid connectivity to data in the cloud or on-premises. *

WS_FTP WinSock File Transfer Protocol, or WS_FTP, is a secure file transfer software package produced by Ipswitch, Inc. Ipswitch is a Massachusetts-based software producer established in 1991 that focuses on networking and file sharing. WS_FTP consis ...

* OpenEdge – platform for building business applications and database management system. *

MarkLogic MarkLogic is an American software business that develops and provides an enterprise NoSQL database, which is also named ''MarkLogic''. They have offices in the United States, Europe, Asia, and Australia. In February 2023, MarkLogic was acquired ...

* Semaphore

Data breaches

In 2023, a security vulnerability in Progress-owned file transfer software MOVEit was exploited in a

data breach A data breach, also known as data leakage, is "the unauthorized exposure, disclosure, or loss of personal information". Attackers have a variety of motives, from financial gain to political activism, political repression, and espionage. There ...

affecting various companies and government organizations. A running total maintained by cybersecurity company

Emsisoft Emsisoft Ltd. (est. 2003) is a New Zealand-based anti-virus software distributed company. They are notable for decrypting ransomware attacks to restore data. History Emsisoft is an anti-malware and cybersecurity software and consulting compan ...

showed that more than 2,500 organizations were known to have been impacted as of October 25, 2023 with more than 80 percent of those organizations being US-based. The cybercriminal organization

Clop Clop or Clops may refer to: * A cross-linguistic onomatopoeic term for the sound of a horse's hooves * Clop (erotic fan art), a slang term for ''My Little Pony''-themed pornography * Clop (hat), a traditional hat in Maramureş, Romania * '' CLOP ...

was alleged to have been partially responsible for the attacks, and claimed responsibility for breaches of 1st Source, the

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

British Airways British Airways plc (BA) is the flag carrier of the United Kingdom. It is headquartered in London, England, near its main Airline hub, hub at Heathrow Airport. The airline is the second largest UK-based carrier, based on fleet size and pass ...

, the

New York City Department of Education The New York City Department of Education (NYCDOE) is the department of the government of New York City that manages the city's public school system. The City School District of the City of New York (more commonly known as New York City Publ ...

Putnam Investments Putnam Investments is an investment management firm founded in 1937 by George Putnam, who established one of the first balanced mutual funds, The George Putnam Fund of Boston. Headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts, it has offices in London, To ...

, and

Shell Shell may refer to: Architecture and design * Shell (structure), a thin structure ** Concrete shell, a thin shell of concrete, usually with no interior columns or exterior buttresses Science Biology * Seashell, a hard outer layer of a marine ani ...

among others.

References

{{reflist, refs= {{cite news , date=October 22, 2014 , title=Progress Software Buys Telerik for $262.5M As Buying Spree Continues, url=https://techcrunch.com/2014/10/22/progress-software-buys-telerik-for-262-5m-as-buying-spree-continues {{cite news , date=June 12, 2013 , title=Progress Software buys a new front-end for its PaaS play, url=http://www.information-age.com/industry/software/123457122/progress-software-buys-a-new-front-end-for-its-paas-play#sthash.uM6t1Ina.dpuf {{cite news , date=December 20, 2005 , title=Progress Software Corporation to Acquire NEON Systems Creating Unparalleled Data Connectivity Leader , url=http://www.finanzen.net/nachricht/Progress-Software-Corporation-to-Acquire-NEON-Systems-Creating-Unparalleled-Data-Connectivity-Leader-63458 , work=Finanzen.net , access-date=September 3, 2014 {{cite web , url=https://investors.progress.com/sec-filings/sec-filing/10-k/0000876167-22-000038 , title=Progress Software Corporation - Annual Report 2021 , access-date=January 28, 2022 {{cite web , url=https://investors.progress.com/node/25811/pdf , title=Progress Reports 2022 Fiscal Fourth Quarter and Year End Results , access-date=January 17, 2023 {{cite news , last=Morgan , first=Timothy Prickett , date=June 28, 2012 , title=Red Hat snaps up open source SOAer FuseSource , url=https://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/06/28/redhat_buys_fusesource/ , work=

The Register ''The Register'' (often also called El Reg) is a British Technology journalism, technology news website co-founded in 1994 by Mike Magee (journalist), Mike Magee and John Lettice. The online newspaper's Nameplate_(publishing), masthead Logo, s ...

, access-date=September 3, 2014 Software companies based in Massachusetts Companies listed on the Nasdaq Software companies of the United States